Ancient history

Ancient history is essentially European history. Its geographical center is the Mediterranean region, and the typical organizational form of ancient societies in this area is the city-state. Ancient philosophy, political thought, religious concepts and ideas of law form the basis of European identity and culture in many respects. Ancient history, especially Greek and Roman history, thus makes a significant contribution to understanding modern concepts of the political, the law and the social and cultural conditions of modernity.

Our examination of European history begins with Homer and extends far beyond the Christianization of the Mediterranean region. Consequently, research in Ancient History also focuses on the new structures of Christian late antiquity up to the Carolingian period. We conduct research into the ancient world out of a direct interest in the ancient world itself, in the fundamental conditions of society and culture, and in the preconditions of modernity and European culture and identity.

We primarily investigate popular communication cultures (graffiti), spaces and their communicative context (especially inscriptions, coins and archaeological findings), cultural transformations (ancient Christianity and its relationship to pagan cults and ideas) and social conditions of political phenomena (the city as a political organism).

In addition to the consideration of archaeological findings, philological, epigraphic and numismatic source work, together with its methodological refinements, is a prerequisite for any ambitious modern research question. Ancient historians have developed a set of tools that allow different sources and source genres to be understood from their context. This includes the analysis of semantic connections as well as the precise examination of texts and their languages. Questions of mediality, discursivity, reception and communication accompany our work.